


The Rumors of My Death...

by posingasme



Category: Supernatural
Genre: British Men of Letters, F/F, F/M, Gen, Hunterverse, Season/Series 12, back from the dead
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-26
Updated: 2017-09-12
Packaged: 2018-12-07 02:31:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 11,870
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11614062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/posingasme/pseuds/posingasme
Summary: Mick is not just smart. He's street smart. And when he sees his end approaching, he has an idea. He knows better than to go to the Winchester boys for help. But there is a lovely huntress whose head is also on the chopping block. He also has a few tricks up his sleeve in case things go south. For one thing, there's a summoning spell he's been wanting to try...





	1. Tricky Mick

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Shaindy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shaindy/gifts).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For Shaindy, who wanted H/C Saileen,  
> And  
> For an anon who wanted Megbriel,   
> and another who wanted  
> Jody/Mary.
> 
> ~Posing

When Mick Davies was a boy in a very elite preparatory school, he had taken a chance at something and won. Sleight of hand was his speciality.

Dr. Hess was impressed with his potential, and he was loyal to his core. And he had known she was wicked to hers.

“I don't understand,” Eileen said. “If you know she's evil-”

Mick shook his head. How to explain? He was sure to face her, so that she could read his lips, and he used British sign language, in hopes that he could amplify his meaning. He had seen her fingerspell with one hand, and it was obvious that she used ASL in spite of her heritage, but he thought the two were similar enough that there would be no mistaking their communication. She was an excellent lip reader. She might have made a good operative if she weren't so independent.

But wasn't it thinking like that which had turned Mick into the monster he was now? The one he should have been back at Kendricks?

He tried again. “As you hunters are always trying to tell me, things aren't always black and white, are they? Not all of the good men are good, and sometimes the bad men...Well, sometimes bad men are necessary.”

“So find a good woman.”

Mick smiled at her sadly. He liked Eileen. It would be impossible not to. “Would that we could. But in lieu of that, we have a powerful woman. And I need to tell you a bit of a story about her. So you have a hope of understanding what I mean to do.”

“Well, you've stalked me. Caught me. Tied me up. I can only assume you plan to talk me to death. Don't mind me. I'm just going to close my eyes.”

He smirked sourly. It was no wonder Sam Winchester was enamored of this woman. “Please don't. Not yet. The future of us all depends on this very conversation.”

“Dramatic.”

He hummed and nodded in agreement. “Dr. Hess is a Lady. But she still worked in the field, until about ten years ago. Generally, the field is the Queen’s backyard, but in at least one instance, she was tasked with finding a particular American hunter.”

“Who?”

“John Winchester.”

Eileen’s eyes narrowed.

So now he had her attention. She wouldn't be closing her eyes and ending the conversation just yet. “That's right. Legendarily stubborn and brilliant hunter, known to be capable of finding patterns in the most convoluted ways, with the least amount of data. Oh, and also father of two stubborn and brilliant legends, one Sam and one Dean Winchester. And Dr. Hess found them.”

“When?”

“About eleven or twelve seasons ago, I should think. Who can be sure, what with all the Apocalypses and all? Anyway, the pair had hunted down a redcap and shot it full of electric current. Unfortunately, they had managed to do the same to Dean, and he suffered irreparable heart damage.”

Eileen was following, but she was beginning to frown severely. He slowed his speech somewhat, in case that helped. He didn't want any miscommunication. He couldn't afford that.

“True to form, Sam refused to let the man die in peace. He brought him to a faith healer.”

If he had expected this to surprise the hunter, she gave him no satisfaction. “Are you going to be making a point soon?”

“Dr. Hess had tracked Sam's phones-not a simple feat, mind you-in hopes of connecting with John. While that became impossible when she learned that Sam couldn't find his father himself, she was able to find a hunter friend of John's that Sam contacted. Through him, both Sam and Dr. Hess learned of a man called Roy, who was claiming to be able to heal.”

He took note of the skeptical eyebrow, and nodded at it.

“Yes, Dr. Hess found it difficult to believe too, and suspected dark magic. And when she received permission from the old men in London to pursue, she dove in. There was a young woman there, Layla, whose condition was critical, and who hoped to be healed. Dr. Hess used on her some of Lady Bevell’s favorite games, and convinced her that she was her long-since deceased mother.”

Eileen snarled at him. “Brainwashing,” she spat.

“It's effective, especially when magic is used. In any case, she inserted herself into the situation to watch how the Winchester boys operated. It was the first time any of the London chapter had encountered them up close. It was how they ended up with an entire file, followed by an entire team of researchers, dedicated to their comings and goings, as it were. Dr. Hess never forgot her personal contact with the men. She called them unprofessional colonials, more concerned with saving their own hides-or more accurately, one another's-than destroying monsters.”

He took a long breath, deciding that Eileen was finally interested enough to let him get to the meat of it all. “But I understand that loyalty to a brother. It was that sort of loyalty which caused me to make my most damning and best decision while at Kendricks. You're a woman who appreciates brevity-”

“Hard to tell you noticed that.”

He chuckled softly, but continued. “I'll sum it all up in this way. I was told by Dr. Hess to kill a classmate as a show of loyalty to the work at hand. But this boy was my best mate, the only one I had ever truly had. And so, when she left us alone in the room with the order that only one of us may exit, I used my training up to that point, and my talent for sleight of hand, and I faked the boy's death. We were successful, and we got him out of the school and away as soon as possible. And I'm about to do it all again.”

The sharp, lovely eyes cut into him. “Do what?”

“Fake a death for Dr. Hess.”

“Whose?”

“My own. And you'll help me. Or you'll be hellhound chow at Mr. Ketch’s command. Help me fake my death, I'll help you fake yours. Then we'll both be free of the Men of Letters. What do you think, Lady Legacy?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And yes, Gillian Barber played both Dr. Hess and Mrs. Rourke, neither of which ever got a first name.


	2. I've Died, You've Died. Everybody's Died

Mary was the one who found Mick. If she hadn't, there was no telling what might have become of him. Eileen had gotten him what he needed, and the plan had worked. Mostly. Except that he had been stored in a locker, with no means of getting out. He might have died in storage, or whenever someone had decided to dissect him, or burn him. 

Mary's eyebrow told him she wasn't quite ready to forgive and forget, but she had to admit there wasn't a better reason for him to be in the storage unit. She had been grateful to have his fingerprints, in any case, since it got her out of the Men of Letters station and back to her car. She rolled her eyes at Mick’s gray face. 

“You throw up on the seats, and you're cleaning them,” she muttered, as she threw the car into reverse and powered out of the reach of Arthur Ketch and Toni Bevell. She didn't know what they wanted with her, but she wasn't about to wait to find out. 

One of the images on the screens had struck her right in the heart. Each of the faces belonged to a hunter, most of them friends of her boys’. But one in particular made her chest tighten in fear, and she couldn't shake it. 

“Mary,” Mick rasped out. He was badly dehydrated after his sham death. 

She sighed. “Don't talk. You're a wreck. And you smell like booze.”

“I'm sorry. And thank you.”

“Don't worry about it. We've all come back to life a time or two. It'll take some time to get you back in full douche mode again.”

Mick shook his head. 

She reached behind her seat as she drove, and finally found a bottle of water to toss at him. “Drink up. I'm going to have plenty of questions soon, and I don't even want to guess what the boys are going to do to you. So enjoy the quiet.” She turned up her classic rock station, and stared hard at the road ahead. 

Mick did as he was told. 

Mary swallowed hard and steered toward the bunker, but all she could think about was the face on the screen, the target for the Brits. Mick had used his only energy upon being revived to explain that Eileen Leahy would be safe, and why, but what about the others?

What about Jody?

Could they truly mean to kill that sheriff, the one who had fought alongside Mary's sons, the one who…

The one who was their mother.

The truth made her flinch, but it was a truth nonetheless. Mary had been destroyed by the same demon she had given her family's future to when she saved John, and part of her hated herself for that. The other part of her loved Jody for being what she hadn't been. Mary knew Sam and Dean loved her. But they didn't know better. Those beautiful, loyal boys, they had grown up into beautiful, loyal men, and Mary was so proud of them. But she knew what they didn't, that she wasn't the mother they deserved. 

Somehow, after spending time with Jody Mills, Mary couldn't bring herself to resent her. She was too good, too sincere, too protective. Beautiful and loyal, just like Sam and Dean. 

Mary wasn't going to let a group of psycho Brits go after Jody. She would protect her. It was the least she could do. And something in her heart sighed contentedly when she made the decision to go to Jody and guard her. But Mary wouldn't think about that right now. 

***

Sam stared down at Eileen’s form on the slab. Dean had walked away, but Sam had stumbled back into the room alone, and his brother had said nothing. Now he was just staring. 

Grief was closing his throat, so he struggled to clear it. He took a shuddered breath. 

How many times had he stood over a grave and spoken to a lost loved one? Jess, when he brought her flowers. Mary, so many times. John, as they gave him his hunter’s funeral. Rufus, while Bobby poured one out. Bobby's might have been the worst. But also Charlie, when he had tried to speak, and Dean and the damn Mark had snapped at him. How many times had he spoken aloud to Dean in that year he had been in Hell? It just seemed to be what Sam needed to do. 

Now there was Eileen, and she couldn't have heard him even if she were alive. But that didn't matter, because she wasn't, and the words were for him anyway. 

He closed his eyes against the lovely face, and sighed. “I don't know what to say to you. I've never known what to say to you. Except that you're incredible. You're not like anyone I've ever known. You're so…” He choked on a sob as he laughed. “You made me happy. That's all I can say. You just made me happy, no matter the circumstance, no matter what was trying to rip us up at the time, you just...Dammit. You just made me happy. And I miss you. I feel like you-you were that one chance in a million.”

Sam's trembling hand rested on hers, but he could not open his eyes. 

“I had other chances. I did. Jess, Amelia. But they didn't know me. They didn't know anything about me. It was a lie that they loved. And they could never have lasted. I know that now. They were fantasies, and they'll be good memories. But they didn't have the same...I feel like you're the only one who could ever have loved the real me. I guess that's wishful thinking. To think I ever had that chance with you.”

He laughed again, weakly, and the tears were finally falling, because he just couldn't fight them off anymore. Sam Winchester, who had fought and caged the Devil, twice, had no more strength to fight against his own grief over what might have been. 

“You know what? I would love for you to wake up and correct me. But till you do, I'm going to just assume I had a chance. It doesn't make this easier, but I want to believe...that the most fascinating and beautiful person I've ever known could have loved me if we’d had the time. I don't care if it's true or not. I would have…” He gasped through his sob, and blinked blindly up at the ceiling. “I would have loved you forever. God, I hope I don't love you forever. I can't...Eileen, I can't feel like this forever. It hurts too much, and I'm too tired, and I've got to keep fighting, and.,.and I'm too tired.”

A hoarse, muffled voice reached his ears then, just two words, flitting on his periphery. “Then rest.”

Sam's blood ran cold, and his hand was on his gun before he had registered the words apart from the sound. Horror gripped him mercilessly when he saw the source. “Eileen? No!” he barked. “Who are you?”

The woman blinked at him. “Sam, when I finally decide to let you sleep with me, you can't pull a gun every time I wake up unexpectedly.”

A whimper sobbed its way out of him, and he backed away, shaking his head. “You're not Eileen.”

But she was narrowing her eyes, as if she were concentrating on his lips, and wouldn't a shifter or demon be able to hear him? “Sam, help me up. You need to get me out of here.”

His poor, mangled heart was pounding, and his breath was running shallow in his chest, and this thing wasn't Eileen, he had checked over her himself, but what if? His panicked mind kept screaming it. What if? What if!

“It's her, Sam. And we gotta jet before Monty Python catches up.”

Sam whirled to find a creature he had been sure was permanently gone. But how many times had he and his brother been permanently gone? “Permanent is relative!” his heart shrieked. If this was really who he thought it was, couldn't Eileen also be who he hoped she was?

The creature smirked at him. “What's the matter, Sam? You look like you've seen a ghost.”

“Meg?” he hissed. 

The eyes flashed black at him. “I'm back in black, baby. Grab your lady friend. This is usually about the time someone bursts in and tries to ruin my day.”

Sam looked back at Eileen. It crossed his mind that he was hallucinating all of this. Between Lucifer and Toni Bevell and everyone in between, Sam had never been completely certain his mind was entirely his own. For that matter, Meg herself had once shared his headspace. 

But Eileen's eyes were pleading with him, and his heart melted at once. “Sam, please.”

“Dean’s outside-”

But a third voice spoke up from the doorway, and this one made Sam surrender to this surreal reality. “I got him!”

Dean never cursed quite so proficiently as when a formerly deceased archangel gripped him by the ear. 

Meg smiled. “The gang’s all here. Do the honors?”

Gabriel grinned back, and raised his free hand. “My pleasure,” he sighed happily, and he snapped his fingers.


	3. Hunters' Lives are Short. Love now.

Unless she had specifically put up the Bat signal, Jody was always a little surprised to find a Winchester at her door. 

Usually, it was both Sam and Dean, there to check on her and the girls, and to help themselves to her leftovers. Once, Sam had shown up under that pretense, but she had quickly learned that Dean was missing, and the young man was more distraught than she had ever seen him. More recently, Sam had arrived to check on her, and it turned out that Dean had pissed him off and he needed a break from his “insufferable nagging and irritating eating habits” for a day. That was when she had learned about Eileen, and had watched Sam's eyes soften and glaze over as he talked about her. It was no wonder Dean was getting on his nerves teasing him, considering the adorable smile the younger man was displaying at the mere thought of this mystery huntress. Then there had been the time Dean had knocked on her door late at night, asking to crash for a few hours, and she had squeezed out of him that he was upset about his mom backing away. That had been a long night. 

But this time, it was neither of the boys. 

Jody smiled in shock. “Hey! Mary! Come on in! What's going on?” She ran a hand through her short hair, as if she could somehow polish her appearance in an instant. 

Mary's soft eyes were watching her. “Hey, Jody. I need to talk to you. Is your...Alex. The girl. Is she here?”

Jody shook her head as she led Mary into the house. She noted that the woman glanced behind her and then appeared to be searching her house as subtly as possible. It made Jody wish she were wearing her gun. “No. She's at a friend's this weekend. What are we expecting? Animal, mineral, vampire?”

She turned to face her then, those lovely blonde waves bouncing gently to frame her face when she moved. “Sorry. I just...Brits. Not expecting them exactly. Just trying to stay ahead of them.”

“They're after you? Do the boys know? How can I help?”

Mary smiled at her with some sort of emotion that Jody couldn't quite read. “Thank you. For saying that. But no. That is, I'm sure they are after me, but that's not why I'm here. I would never lead them to you and put your family in danger. Except that they're coming for you, and I want to convince you to run or at least be here to protect you when they do.”

Jody's heart was pounding. “They're after me? Why? I'm one of the good guys!”

She received a snort. “Yeah. And they're not. At least not the ones in charge. They're trying to exterminate the American hunters, Jody. And that includes you and Claire Novak.”

“Claire?” Jody grabbed for her phone. “I need to warn her!”

Mary nodded. “Tell her to lie low until we can get this figured out. Dean says she's good at that?”

Jody returned the snort as she tapped out a message urging Claire to call. “At running and disappearing? Yeah. It's an art.” 

When that was done, and Claire had assured Jody that she would do just that, she sent another message to Alex that she needed to get to Donna, who said she would be happy to have her for a week or so, and to “call me if you need me to come back you up on this, JoJo, and I'll be there before you can wink, you betcha.” It was good to have friends. 

She hadn't known for sure that Mary was one. 

At last, the two women collected and compared notes on weapons, and hashed out the pros and cons of staying versus running, and opted to stay and barricade. 

Together. 

Jody's stomach did some funny things at that. 

“You think we can chance a few glasses of wine?” she sighed finally. 

Mary smiled. “I think that's a risk I'm willing to take, so long as we can still shoot straight.”

“Thank God.” She brought a bottle and two glasses into the living room, and poured. “So?” she said as she handed Mary a glass, and raised her eyes to meet those lovely ones watching her. “Why are you here, Mary?”

The woman blinked. “I told you...We just spent an hour planning-”

“I know. The British nerds of doom. But there were other hunters on that hit list. Some you know. Some your boys know. Why are you here? Could've just called me, warned me, and let me take my chances. But you're here, where you know the bad guys are going to be. I'm guessing there are both safer places for you to hide out, and folks less capable of taking care of themselves than me that you could have chosen to protect.”

Pink flushed Mary's pretty face then, and it reminded Jody a little of Sam’s occasional shy, endearing awkwardness. “I need to be here,” she responded simply, into her wine. 

“That doesn't tell me much.”

“Look, I just wanted to return the favor. You looked after my boys. I'm looking after you.”

Jody swallowed her wine with her sudden mild disappointment. “Oh. Okay. Well, I appreciate that.”

Mary looked intently into her wine for nearly a full minute. “It isn't just that.”

“Then…”

The woman licked her lips, and Jody caught herself holding her breath as she watched. “I'm grateful that you were able to be what my sons needed when I wasn't here for them. I maybe resented that a tiny bit at first, but I really am grateful. And sometimes I wish I had had a friend like you while I was hunting all those years ago. I tried to leave the life behind me. But maybe if I'd had...someone like you in that life...I'm a very good hunter. But it's a lonely way to love.” She looked up at last. “It's a lonely way to live,” she corrected quickly. “I'm just saying that fighting all alone or living a civilian life with someone who doesn't know that part of you…”

“Both choices suck.”

Mary laughed in surprise, even as her eyes were reddening. “Yeah. You get it.”

“I get it. Think it's easy being a cop who hunts on the side? I've got my girls. But I have to be strong and confident for them. My department? I have to take charge there. I can't have any relationships because it would be a lie, no matter what. So yeah. I get it. Hooking up with an occasional grungy hunter is the only real connection you can chance.”

“Exactly. That's it exactly. I never found a hunter I could really trust like that. A post-hunt celebration on adrenaline is all I've enjoyed since I've been back. And at least one of those is now trying to kill me. There was a guy in Tulsa, and then woman I worked with in Colorado, but that’s always just a night. It only staves off the loneliness at the moment. It's a hard way…”

Jody took hold of Mary's glass, to set it beside her own on the table. Then she took both of the strong but delicate hands in hers, and found them trembling. “It's a hard way to love,” she said quietly. 

Mary gave a shaky sigh of longing, and that was enough. Jody leaned in and pressed soft lips against soft lips, and felt Mary melt into her embrace. With every touch of hands on faces and fingers through hair, and skin tingling with want, Jody promised that she would be the easy way to love, and Mary communicated the same with eagerness that made them both breathless.


	4. The Resilience of a Winchester Heart

Sam hadn't said anything yet.

Dean was alternating between bellowing and telling everyone else to calm down. As far as Sam could tell, Meg was the living embodiment of the Devil’s Advocate, but only because she enjoyed getting a rise out of Dean. Eileen was snapping at Mick at every opportunity, but she had the coolest head in the room. Mick was going over the same story for the third time, with increasing frustration. Sam was especially concerned about the bored look on Gabriel's face, considering he had seen firsthand what happened when the Trickster grew bored. And Mary had just walked out with a vague statement about warning Jody Mills in person. Sam had seen the way Jody and his mother had been so curious about one another, and he wasn't entirely surprised by that, and he had insisted that Dean let it go without a fight. Dean had rolled his eyes, thrown up his hands, and gone back to arguing with Mick and Meg.

But Sam himself was quiet. He had heard every argument at least twice, and as always, he processed the data in his mind and decided with his heart. Everything else was just noise and glaring warnings at the archangel when he tried to touch things.

“What about Castiel?”

Dean whirled on Meg. “For the last time, I don't know! You want to find him? He's been AWOL since the baby shower we threw for Satan’s seed at the portal to the Penthouse!”

Mick was shaking his head. “He's warded every which way.” He scowled at Gabriel. “That's who I was trying to summon when I ended up with him.”

Gabriel waved, and popped another gummy bear into his mouth.

“And again, when I got her,” he sighed at Meg.

She smirked. “Cas and I have a bit of history. And apparently so do he and Captain Clam Slammer.”

Gabriel wiggles his eyebrows lewdly, but kept chewing.

Eileen was frowning while staring at Meg’s lips. Both Sam and Mick were doing their best to interpret everything, but some things were beyond their vocabularies. “Why do you call him that?”

This time, the Trickster grinned and wiggled those eyebrows at Eileen, and Sam finally decided that was enough.

“You know what? Eileen, let’s-Can I talk to you?”

Dean turned to him. “You're going to leave me with Larry, Curly and Meg?”

Sam considered briefly, then shrugged. “Looks like.”

His brother sneered at him. “I'll remember that next time Lucifer locks himself in your bedroom.”

He scowled at him, and gestured to Eileen, who nodded and followed him from the war room to the library.

They looked at one another for a long moment.

“Sam,” she breathed.

Sam's arms pulled her into an embrace, his hand cradling her precious head, his chest confirming her beating heart, and his trembling communicating his relief.

“I was so scared.”

The heart he had tried to reinforce with anger his whole life finally shattered in his chest. Shards lodged in his throat, and he had to gasp to breathe. But he simply held her tighter.

When at last he stepped back to take her face in both hands, he looked into her eyes with an intensity that shocked even him. Something feral and lethal was building in his gut. “Did it hurt? Could you feel it?”

She watched his lips, then nodded once. “Awful,” she confirmed.

Suddenly, Sam wanted to kill someone. A hellhound, for tearing this soft skin. Mick, for letting this play out in spite of his overarching plan for survival. Ketch and his thugs, for their vicious war against the hunters on American soil, for scaring this fearless huntress. Anyone. For anything.

“Sam,” she murmured, breaking through his wrath and bringing him back to the here and now. “I hate to sound like a girl. But I'm tired and I don't want to fall asleep alone. Could you...can you hold me for a while?”

And just like that, his heart was mended, softer but stronger than before. He signed as well as he could as he spoke. “Eileen, I will hold you forever.”


	5. This is the world we live in

Mick and Dean took their bickering and whiskey into another part of the bunker, and that left just the two newly revived immortals.

Meg glanced at Gabriel warily. “So. How'd you bite it?”

He snorted. “My dear brother Lucifer put an angel blade into my gut. You?”

She smirked a little at that, then shrugged. “King of Hell. Same.”

“The sleazy crossroads ass? Yeah, I heard he got a promotion. Wonder if little Sammy knows how that Ketch guy got himself a pet Hellhound. Far as I know, only a Prince of Hell can make one of those bitches play fetch. Or Luci.”

“I've had my share of experiences with the nasty pups myself. They only respond to anyone else if they've been compelled to by their Lord. Which, much as I hate to say it, is Crowley now.”

Gabriel giggled a little. “Sammy's gonna be pissed,” he sang out. “Assuming he ever focuses enough to make that connection.”

“This amuses you, halo?”

He popped another gummy bear. “Look. There are too many humans. Too many people, making too many problems, and not much love to go round. This is the world we live in. And these are the hands we’re given. Maybe we should use them to-”

“Are you using Genesis to come on to me? Because wow.”

“Let's live for today. Tomorrow may never come. Tonight is almost over-”

Meg burst into laughter. “Toto. Nice.”

“I'm just going to keep going through lines till I find what works. You can stop me at any time.”

She watched him, and considered. This angel was the most powerful creature she had ever encountered, aside from the two who had killed them. And Castiel...What was it about angels, she chided herself ruefully.

“Ooh. You are a loyal little thing, aren't you?” Gabriel stood and took a step toward her, intrigued. “First Lucifer and his Princes. Then that rascal rebel soldier, Cassie. And now you're wondering what you owe them.”

Meg raised an eyebrow. Her fight or flight instinct was beginning to make her meat suit’s skin crawl.

Suddenly, a-frankly, incredibly hot-dangerous sneer came over Gabriel's face. “Let me tell you. Nothing. You owe them precisely nothing. They don't deserve the loyalty of a warrior like you. None of them do. Just as they never deserved my loyalty and love, they don't deserve yours.”

Meg could feel power radiating from this creature, and she thrilled with it. “What are you saying?” she murmured, hating the awe which had crept into her voice.

He stepped back. “Death has been very helpful in getting my priorities straight, you beautiful thing. I'm a little more jaded, a little darker than before. I spent millennia doing everything I could to avoid the fight that was coming, only to discover they never gave me a second thought. Raphael was at Michael's side. Lucifer had his demon army. And just like the seven billion humans, I didn't even warrant an afterthought during the Apocalypse. I scanned Dean and Sam Winchester’s heads when I got hold of them today. And wow. The fourth of the Firstborns didn't even get a footnote in the new gospels!”

She smirked. “So you're pissed you were forgotten?”

Gabriel's power flashed in his eyes in a quiet rage. “Pissed? No. I'm just done. My whole life spent dreading what my brothers would do to one another, what would happen to the humans and their art and their humor, and everything else they create that we can't...I ate my freaking heart out all that time, awaiting the day I looked down and saw that the trumpet had landed in my hands, and it was time for the big showdown...And it turns out, it was all for nothing. Lucifer's army and Michael's soldiers killed tens of thousands of humans, powering their war machines with souls at both ends.”

“You've killed people,” she said quietly.

“Yeah. Sure. Who hasn't? But I punished individual douches. I judged them each, and I had my fun. How many of those killed did Michael or Lucifer or Raphael even notice? How many did they care enough to actually judge?”

Meg nodded. This time, she was the one who took a step forward. “None. Not the humans, not the demons, not even the lesser angels.”

“Because we meant nothing.”

“I get it,” she breathed. “We were all pawns. You were a slightly bigger pawn than the rest of us.”

Gabriel gave her a soft snort. “Don't be too certain.”

“So what does this mean?”

“It means I'm done hiding. I'm done fighting. I'm done trying to prevent the fighting. Lucifer went and made a nephilim in the time I was gone, and Michael is out of commission, and Raphael is dead. Even the little seraph who could is AWOL. This isn't a world I know anything about. It's a land of confusion, and there's not much love to go round.”

Meg had loved Castiel, and she had worshipped Lucifer. There was no denying that, nor really any regret either. But Gabriel's angsty review of the End Times and beyond struck her as truth. She had fought for her causes, and even when her side had won, she never had. She had been willing to die, for Lucifer and Azazel, for Castiel and the Winchesters. But the idea that no one had even noticed or appreciated her contributions, her loyalty, cut her deeper than the angel blade.

This archangel, tainted with bitterness but shining with mischief, was watching her. The archangel, who listed among his fears the fate of the artwork humans created, and their senses of humor, he awaited her response.

“Not much love,” she agreed. “Maybe we should make some.”

A wicked grin was his only answer.


	6. Alliances and Loyalists

Mary’s love life had been less than perfect. Her husband had been killed by the same demon twice, the same one, in fact, who had killed her. And while she loved John, and she certainly knew he loved her, they had not had what she could call a perfect marriage. Some days, she missed him so badly she ached, but other days, she remembered the reality of life in the Winchester household, the tension and arguing. John had even moved out for a time. Even with John, she had often been lonely.

“Seems like blasphemy to say it,” she murmured. 

Jody was watching her with those intelligent eyes. 

They lay in bed, slim bodies naked with a confidence that came with maturity, and yet a shyness that came with unfamiliarity. Neither was used to being viewed. Each was comfortable in her own skin, and each was a little in awe of the other. 

“You think you and John would've made it?” Jody asked softly. 

“I think so. I don't know. To think that he became a hunter...God, it's so hard to believe. I hid things from him our whole marriage, and I thought I was protecting him. Protecting us. But maybe if I had told him, if I'd taught him, he might have…”

“No.” Jody reached for her, and Mary let herself be held in a way she hadn't since John. “No, you were doing what you could to keep them safe.”

“No one is safe. I know that now.”

Jody sighed. “Well, you've heard my horror story. I've heard yours. The Apocalypse screwed us both out of our husbands and kids. I mean, I had already lost my son, but...but now his memory is so bloody...Anyway, then I lost Bobby and Asa, and I nearly bit it trying to date the King of Hell. You also messed around with a psycho killer with a pretty accent, and got burned. I think the universe owes us.”

“I didn't ask to be brought back.”

“And I didn't ask to outlive my son. But here we are, and we have to keep grinding. It isn't in us to quit. You could've called your reaper anytime. Instead, you fought. I fought. And we both know the fight isn't going to end just because we're tired.”

Mary smiled at her. “I'm tired,” she confirmed. “But I'm a damn good fighter.”

She basked in Jody’s grin. “And so am I. I know you're a one night kind of lady, but let me make you a counter argument.”

She snickered. “Yeah?”

“Stay with me. One of us could lose a battle anytime. But we're safer together. And we each deserve some love while we're still in the game.”

“And good sex.”

Jody burst into laughter. “Yeah,” she confirmed, kissing Mary’s pale lips. “And fantastic sex.”

Mary laughed too, and suddenly she didn't feel quite so tired as before. Jody was right. They could die bloody any minute, and it would be devastating. But that wasn't a good enough reason not to love and live until that moment. It was strange and frightening, but it was what they both needed. They were survivors. They were fighters. And in the face of the world's most powerful evil, they would be lovers. 

Hunters didn't have homes, not like other people did. They had bases of operation, houses they worked out of. But Jody was a home, the first one Mary had really ever had, a safe sanctuary where her true self was revealed, and yet she was loved anyway. 

***

Mick was drinking. Dean was drinking too, but as he had already observed, Mick was a champion of “can drink.” Death apparently had not changed at least that. 

The shouting and arguing had faded as their mutual exhaustion became dominant. Dean shook his head at his...what? Frenemy? Ally? Counterpart? 

“What's that about?” Mick demanded in exasperation. “You gonna start yelling again? I've been mostly dead all day, so you'll excuse me if I tap out of this round, yeah?”

Dean began to laugh. “Mostly dead all day. Says the man in black.”

“I'm in your stupid band tee shirt, aren't I?”

“That's not what I...It's Zeppelin, dude. You'd prefer the Beatles?”

“What? No. I'd prefer you give me a chance to be alive a whole day before we start bickering again.”

Dean's face softened. “First time’s hardest.”

“What's that supposed to…” Then Mick began to smile too. “First death, you mean.”

“Yeah. It's nobody's favorite ride.”

Mick snorted into his crystal tumbler. “It was plain awful, that's what it was. Your mother saved my life snooping in that storage unit as she did. I wouldn't have liked being found by Mr. Ketch, I can tell you.” He shrugged. “Not that I'd have woken with him. Very few people might have been able to do that.”

“Why?”

The man stared moodily into his drink. “It was worked into the bloody spell, that I would only awaken at the touch of someone with more good than wicked bastard in his heart. That ruled out most of my colleagues, and proves your mother's honor.”

A confusing storm of emotion began to fog his mind. “She didn't need to prove anything to you.”

“Not to me. I'm only saying the spell required a true heart to work. You'd mother and your brother were able to wake me and Ms. Leahy. It's reassuring.”

“Good thing it was them. You'd still be on a slab in a cooler if I'd found you. I don't know how much wicked bastard I got in me, but some days, I ain't so sure how much good I got either. When I went hunting with Ketch...Till he started torturing, I was...Anyway. Good on you. You're awake. Now what?”

Mick watched him for a moment, then sighed. “I told you. We warn the American hunters, the good ones, and we disappear.”

“And I told you. Not happening.”

“You're as stubborn as your father.”

He felt a violent flinch strike him. “Excuse me? What do you know about my father?”

But Mick stood and put his glass on the table. He walked toward the door to escape to the showers. At last, he stopped. “I know he must have been a bitch to love, but he must have loved you. We learned about his deal to save you. The same deal you made for Sam. And that's a fierce love you Winchester men share. Mary too. The only thing I ever felt so strongly about was the Men of Letters code and mission. And now I'm lost without it.”

Dean blinked at the sentiment, but then he smiled in sympathy. “You got your own code, man. You proved that. You'll be a good hunter one day, assuming you don't drop dead again before you learn how.”

Mick shuddered. “Please. I'm a researcher. I'm happy to help. From off-stage.”

He nodded. “Your ass better be on stage and ready to help by oh-seven-hundred, or you may as well wish you were still dead. You brought back an archasshole and Hell’s Snarkiest Lady Demon. You got some karma to work off.”

Mick sighed.


	7. Dynamic Shift

Eileen hunted ghosts and banshees. Sometimes a hunt took a turn, and she ended up with something else entirely, and she hunted that too. But she never went looking for anything else. An American hunter had once asked for her help in taking out a crocotta, since his voice had no affect on her, and she had been happy to help. Her wheelhouse was destroying ghosts and banshees, and she was damn good at what she did, and if something else arose, well, she could handle that too. 

It had never occurred to her that it would be a hellhound that would take her out one day. 

Lying in Sam's arms, she reminded herself that he had killed hellhounds, that they had a special place of loathing in his heart, because, as she had learned, they had carried off his brother's soul once. 

Eileen had never needed anyone to keep her safe before. But she was grateful for Sam now. 

“You're warm,” she signed. 

She wasn't sure his eyes were open, but she could feel him hum in response. Then his hands moved in front of her, and she laughed. 

“When did you learn so much Sign?” she asked silently. She loved lying with her back to his chest, but it made some signs far less precise, so she moved to face him, and left enough room between them to move their hands and see his lips. He curled his legs around hers instead, as if he too was reluctant to separate. She liked it. 

She also liked that he also watched her lips, but for an entirely different reason. “After meeting you,” he said, and signed, “I started watching videos online, trying to learn a few things every week. It's been almost a year now. I tried to practice with someone at a school called Gallaudet for a while, through Skype, but I don't like having my face on the screen. I've known too many people who can hack face recognition software. She got weirded out eventually when I would only show myself from the mouth down.”

“It's a good mouth,” she argued. 

He laughed. “I'm glad you think so.”

“You've been practicing since we met?”

The shy smile was back, and she adored it. “Yeah, I mean…” Sam had stopped signing long enough to put his hand through his hair, and seemed to realize he was about to stammer. He took a deep breath and tried again. “I told Dean I was researching ways to communicate during hunts without talk. We gesture sometimes, and we do pretty well with just looks most of the time. But I told him that meeting you made me realize it could be helpful to learn a few signs for the job.”

Eileen smirked at him. 

“Yeah, he didn't believe me either. I guess I just really hoped I'd see you again, and I wanted to be ready if I did. Not that I ever figured out what I'd say. So I tried to learn to say everything I could. And anyway, it reminded me of you. There isn't a whole lot in our lives that we can really look forward to. I got to where I was looking forward to my little study sessions a few times a week.”

“But we've talked a few times. You never use much.”

His cheeks were pinking beautifully. “Yeah. I tried. But when I…” He took another deep breath. “I get nervous when I see you.”

Eileen giggled at him. “I can't tell,” she teased. 

For that, she received a scowl. “So how am I doing?”

She adored this man. He was strong and capable like no one she had ever met, and sweet and cute and unsure all the same. “Not bad.” 

Sam sighed happily. 

“Sam? Thank you for holding me but not pushing.”

He watched her, and shrugged. “What do you mean?”

“You are willing to sleep with me without sleeping with me. It's nice. Thank you.”

Sam was quiet for a moment. He took her hand and kissed her fingertips, then released her again. “Eileen, first, I would never push. You don't need to thank me for that. And second...I lost you. You were gone, and I couldn't breathe knowing I would never get the chance to tell you how badly I wanted to hold you. You might have laughed, or punched me in the nose or something, but at least I would have said it. Losing that chance...I wasn't sure I'd ever take a full breath without you again.”

Tears burned in her eyes, and she had to blink against them so she could see his words. 

“Eileen, I'm in love with you. And-and I know you just came back. You've been through something terrible, and you just need a friend right now, and you've let me kiss you, but you don't want anything-It's okay. But you should know. I promised myself I would say it. I'm in love with you. And I'm so glad you're alive.”

His hands were shaking, and she could feel that he was speaking, but there was a trembling to the rumble of his voice too. She tried to smile at him. 

“I'm just so glad you're alive,” he finished, and then the tears came, washing both faces. 

Eileen took Sam's hands in hers, and kissed them just as he had done with hers. “Me too.”

He sputtered a laugh. “I guess so!”

But she shook her head. “No. I mean, I'm in love too, Sam. I'm in love with you too.”

She felt him collapse into sobs, and in an instant, things had shifted, and her strong arms were the ones holding him. Eileen noted that she liked this dynamic just as much.


	8. Proposal

It felt good to be back in battle. 

Meg tore through the hellhound and its brazen, infuriated master with glee. It was a woman with a nasal accent that vaguely reminded her of both Alistair and Crowley at the same time, and that just made it all the easier to slice through her windpipe to prevent more hysterical threats. The Lady of Letters, it seemed, was far less confident without her magic. 

Gabriel grinned and winked at her as he dove through the carnage. His opening act had been a tongue in cheek miracle that had made Meg snicker. He had immediately transformed all the sharp objects in the hands of the enemy into loaves and all the spell components into fishes. The battleground stank, but it had been pretty funny, and definitely effective. 

Also funny had been watching one nerd punch Gabriel in the face. Everyone had been surprised by the way the archangel had blown back, spurting blood from his vessel's nose. 

“Nobody makes me bleed my own blood,” Gabriel had growled, and he had gestured at the man, who instantly tore into two horrible, gory pieces and thudded onto the floor. 

Meg smirked. “Impressive,” she purred, then whirled and sank her blade into a charging opponent. 

In the end, they didn't kill them all, though Meg might have liked to. Gabriel finally threw the rest of them against a wall, and Meg pinned them there while the Trickster did his talking. 

“So your choices are these. Die at the hands of both Heaven and Hell, or put out a cease and desist order to all field operatives, then run away. Oh, and I'll be destroying your hierarchy, and stealing all the information you've got on Angels, including my sweet, demented brother Lucifer and his devil spawn, so there's that. And I like those brass knuckles with the pretty symbols. I'll be taking those too. So? What's it going to be?”

It turned out that loyalty to their code only went so far once the British Men of Letters had watched one of their brethren torn in half. 

As they walked away from the ruins of the Men of Letters base, Gabriel was smiling to himself. 

“What's that smirk? I thought you were a lover and not a fighter. You seemed to enjoy that bloodbath as much as I did, halo.”

“I weighed each of their hearts before smiting their faces. I only killed the self-righteous assholes.”

“Good of you.”

Gabriel hummed in agreement. “I'm a good guy.” Then he took her arm and pulled her into a kiss that she couldn't help melting into. Power radiated off of him like an electric current. 

She liked the way her lips buzzed after touching his. 

Then he turned a wicked smile on her. “You are the warrior goddess I've been looking for all my life. Qamaits, Athena, Wadjet, Kali...None of them had the humor and passion you've got. You get me.” 

He held out an offering, and she burst into laughter. 

“Fight punks and smite hypocrites at my side?” he proposed with a rare sincerity. 

Meg grinned. “I'm not big on jewelry. But I'll make an exception for this one.”

With that, she accepted the Enochian brass knuckles, and silently vowed she would never take them off. She had believed Lucifer and then Castiel were the angels worth dying for. But this one...This one was worth living for. 

“We've paid any debt we owe for being brought back by the summoning spell that wasn't even meant for us,” Gabriel declared. “Let’s go play.”

Exhilaration ran through her, as the weight of vengeance and duty slid off her back onto the floor. “Your move, halo.”

Gabriel sighed happily, and winked, and with that gesture, stole them both away to begin a new life of adventure, beholden to no one.


	9. Ketch and No Release

When Ketch arrived at the home of Jody Mills, he was already lethally angry. Mary was nowhere to be found. Toni and her incompetent peers had been slaughtered by a mere demon and some lunatic angel, who he assumed was Castiel, or perhaps Lucifer himself. The base had been compromised. Agents had been called in out of the field, including him. He had even heard that the Old Lady had also been, in the words of a witness, “tossed unceremoniously into a black hole.” Ketch guessed that meant a reaper had been assisting the demon and angel, and had said something about the Void, but it really didn't matter now what had happened. The British Men of Letters were on the run, and he was the only one staying on mission. 

All that mattered was destroying the American hunters who had brought all this on them with their completely unprofessional behavior. They allied with monsters, they made deals with demons, they let dangerous creatures and witnesses walk free. And most of all, Mary. 

Mary had been a beautiful weapon. She had been his match in all ways. He had once thought perhaps Toni Bevell...but no. It was Mary Winchester. She was the only one who would ever be enough, the only one who would ever understand him. She was the same kind of brutal. He had seen it in Dean too, but Mary was a masterpiece. Ketch was not one for allowing anything to escape him. That meant Mary too. 

He would find her, and complete her training himself, and the two of them would become a hunting team like this filthy, wicked world had never known. He just had to find her. 

First, he would finish the job, and kill the next hunters on his docket. With a little luck, he would find Claire Novak and Jody Mills at the same place, and check the two of them off his list, so he could move on to the Fitzgerald and Chambers families. He never left a job unfinished, unlike those sloppy Winchester boys. But it would be nice to be free to hunt his own prey, and it thrilled him at a primitive level to know that if Mary wanted to run, she would be a brilliant challenge to chase after. 

First things first. He knocked on the door of the home belonging to Jody Mills.


	10. Monster

She wasn't one to let others do her work for her. Eileen had taken care of herself and countless others for as long as she could remember. She was a fierce huntress, she was a clever Legacy, and she was a born-again survivor. She didn't need anyone taking care of her, or fighting her fights.

This wasn't her fight anymore.

“Ketch killed you. He's still out there somewhere. And if he finds out you're still alive-”

“I'm not,” she murmured.

Sam frowned. “What does that mean?” he said while he signed.

“I'm not still alive, Sam. I'm alive again.”

Of all people, Sam would know the difference. But he shook his head. “Eileen, the point is that we need to take Ketch out. He's a psychopath.”

Mick had stumbled into the common area a little after two in the morning to report that the British Men of Letters on American soil had been obliterated. He and Dean had spent the night arguing, drinking and then hacking, and they had finally gotten into the network, only to find the entire operation in shambles. One bit of data was a repeating command for all field agents and hunters to book flights with urgency, to drop everything and go back home to await “debriefing.” Mick had shuddered when Sam asked what that would entail.

From what Mick and Dean had been able to uncover, the destruction had been wrought by “a crazy halo and a demon bitch.” Dean had smiled grimly. “Remind you of anyone?” he sighed.

Sam had snorted. “Unless Agents Beyoncé and Z are back on tour, I'm thinking Gabriel and Meg had a busy night.”

Mick had nodded too. “Gabriel told me he was glad I so royally botched my attempt at summoning Castiel. Then he said something about a Lannister and some debts, and flew off.”

“Well, that accounts for that,” Dean muttered. “What about the field guys and hunters?”

“What about Ketch and Bevell?” Sam snarled.

Mick cleared his throat. “Lady Bevell is dead, at the hands of the aforementioned demon bitch. Mr. Ketch has yet to return or respond to the return order.”

So Sam had determined that the British hunter was their top priority. But Eileen had taken him aside, and said that she didn't want to go, and she'd rather he didn't either. Sam had been shocked.

“He is a psychopath,” she agreed. “No one sends uses a literal hound of hell to kill someone unless they're a psychopath.”

“But you don't want me to hunt him down. He's a monster, Eileen. That Kendricks valedictorian douche was just a prick. But this one really is a monster.”

But she shook her head. “I kissed you, Sam.”

He stared at her.

“I slept beside you.”

Sam nodded in confusion.

“I can't lose you. If you really do care about me, I want you to stay away from this monster.”

It looked like she had slapped him across the face. “What? Eileen, I'm a hunter! I thought-I thought you would understand a hunter’s-”

“Not this one,” she insisted. “Please. Hunt anything else. I'll hunt anything else with you. Not this one.”

Realization washed out the frustration on Sam's handsome face. He took a deep breath. “With me.”

She nodded. “I'll hunt anything else with you,” she confirmed. “I can't. Not this one.”

Sam took a deep breath. He was quiet for a moment. Then he sighed. “Eileen, he's dangerous. I can't let him...I mean, I get it. God, of course I get it. You don't want to have to face the guy who had a hellhound maul you. And you think if I go to hunt him down, you should go too. But, Eileen, I can't let this guy just disappear. He's too dangerous. If he hurts someone else, and I didn't at least try to put him down...Well, Dean would say that's on us. And he'd be right. I'm sorry. I just can't sit on the bench for this one.”

She gazed up at his lips and hands during his speech, and then echoed his sigh. “Then I guess I should get my gear.”

“No. No, you stay here. You don't have to-”

She cut him off with a shake of the head. “I'm not going to sit on my ass while you find that monster. I don't want you to go after him. But if you're going, so am I. I can't sit and wait to find out if he's done to you what he did to me. You'll be safer with me by your side.”

Sam's eyes were sparkling, and his smile was soft and full of adoration. His hands moved slowly. “Thank you,” he signed. “Nobody ever understood before.”

She shrugged. “You're not that complicated, Sam Winchester. You save people. You hunt things. You look out for your family. Come on. If you live through this, maybe I'll let you kiss me again-”

To her delight, the sweet, shy man grabbed her face with two hands, and pulled her into an ecstatic embrace. His lips covered hers like they had done this a thousand times. She wanted a thousand more.

But at that moment, a very gray Dean barreled into the library, startling them apart, and the brothers locked gazes.

“What's wrong?” she signed and said.

Dean looked like he was going to be sick. But he gave them a grim smile. “Seems Mr. Ketch just raided Jody's place.”

Eileen watched Sam's mouth drop. His eyes widened frantically. “What? Is she-Did he-”

“She's okay. She's okay. Jody is. She called. But Mom was there.”

Eileen looked from one to the other quickly, and saw dread in one face, and terror in the other. “What happened?” She demanded.

Dean licked at his lips, and took a shaky breath to tell them what he knew.


	11. What a Typical Winchester.

Jody had seen far more than her fair share of dead bodies in her time. She had killed more than most law enforcement units as a whole do in a decade. In spite of being sadly familiar with the phenomenon, it was never going to be easy to watch the life drain from someone. 

Sometimes it hurt worse than others. 

The Winchesters were a family of superhumans, as far as Jody could tell. They should have died a dozen times or more, and, from what she had heard from Bobby and other hunters, and oddly phrased things the boys said themselves, she suspected they had. The boys’ father was a legend in the hunting network, and their grandfather Campbell, Mary’s father, was sometimes remembered at gatherings as a ruthless hunter from a long line of ruthless hunters. And then there was Mary. 

She pressed her hand hard against the bleeding. She had called Dean and given him the word. Ketch was dead. One of the human monsters Jody was actually trained to fight against. She and Mary had been ready, or at least as ready as one could be when they were expecting company like that psycho. The fact that Mary was even there had thrown Ketch off his game just enough for her and Jody to gain an advantage. 

But it hadn't been enough to prevent him from getting off the shot that should have struck Jody directly in the heart before succumbing to his own wounds. Mary had seen him take aim, and had shoved Jody aside; she had taken the shot herself. 

Ketch had lived just long enough to realize what he had done. His eyes had widened in horror, and he had screamed Mary’s name through the blood in his throat with the last of the air in his lungs. Now he lay in his own blood, glassy eyes staring at what Jody could only assume was Crowley’s homefires burning. 

Mary was gasping. 

Jody cursed through a phone conversation with Dean on speaker phone, though, all the while, she centered her focus on first aid for her lover. Because that's what she was. 

“You hear me?” she barked at Mary while her hands worked frantically. “Hey! You hear me? My lover. And I've lost enough of those! We both have. So if you're going to be a damn hero and take a bullet for me, the least you can do is stay awake while I talk to you! Dammit, I'm trying to save your ass, and you're just trying to fall asleep. Typical…”

Mary gave her a shaky smile through pale lips staining red. “Bitch,” she wheezed. 

“Winchesters!” Jody continued. “Always trying to die on me! If you live, I promise to tell you about the time your firstborn nearly got himself eaten because he couldn't keep it in his pants at church. Yeah. You want that story, don't you? Come on, Winchester. Stay with me.”

She could hear the sirens, but they seemed too far off. She tried to focus her mind on the story, and to do so, she repeated it to Mary. 

“Dean and Sam will be here soon, in their Fed personas, and they'll erase this guy from the records, okay? Give him a fake identity, make him a-a serial killer they've been trying to track. You came over to visit. We're old friends, right? Mary?”

The woman was dangerously pale and weakening by the second. But she nodded by force of will. 

“Right,” Jody choked out. “Old friends, from way back. And this guy we don't know, he burst in and-and we did what we had to do. I did. I'm an officer. I shot him. But he shot at me while I took my shot, and you...you stupid, stupid hero, you got in the way, and he...and he…”

Mary's hand slipped off Jody's wrist, and she began to slump in the sheriff’s arms. 

There was nothing left that she could do. She could hear the pounding of the feet around her, knew at some level that the EMTs had arrived, but she simply couldn't help it this time. Like she hadn't since the night she had lost Sean and Owen, Jody Mills let herself break into sobs, and unlike that night years ago, there was nothing left. This time, there was no fight to pull her back in, to make her dry her tears and stiffen her spine. The fight was over this time, and she couldn't pretend she wasn't filled with fear and grief. 

It was all over but the heartache.


	12. You and Me, and Satan's Baby Make Three

Castiel shook his long coat while he stood at the door, assessing the situation. Dean had once compared him, unfavorably, he suspected, to a dog shaking off the rain. The droplets scattered, and he cleared his throat. 

Mick looked up from staring at the blank wall. “Oh. Well, if it isn't our wayward angel.”

“It is,” Castiel confirmed. “Unless you've lost track of another.”

The man smirked at him. “You've been hiding deep under some powerful warding, my friend.”

“Yes, and I intend to return to it as soon as I have been caught up on events. Where are Sam and Dean? I was told they needed me here.”

Before Mick could respond, a large hunter turned the corner into the waiting room, and stopped cold when he caught sight of the angel. “Cas!”

“Hello, Dean.”

Green eyes flashed in anger. “Where the hell have you been, man? I've left you like a hundred messages!” He pointed at the Man of Letters. “He tried to summon your winged ass! All I could think was you were dead, except that Mick said the spell would've told him that!”

Castiel lowered his gaze. “I'm sorry, Dean. It was necessary for me to be untraceable. It still is. But I got your messages, and I...I'm here to help, if I can. Where is Mary?”

“She's-she's lying upstairs with a bullet in her, man! I prayed for you! Where the hell have you-”

“I'm here now. And I'm grateful to see I'm not too late to help,” he said pointedly. 

Dean was nodding. “Yeah. Yeah, come on. Follow me.”

He walked beside his once and future friend, and even though each avoided the other’s eye, he spoke softly. “I thought it was the British Men of Letters who did this. Why then is Mick Davies…”

“He's invested in our side. I'm not ready to call him one of the good guys. But he ain't the one who did this.”

“How is Sam?”

“Better with Eileen here.”

Castiel frowned at him finally. “The hunter? I thought he said in his voicemail that she was killed. It was a long voicemail. He seemed inebriated.”

“Yeah. I guess he was. I didn't know he called you. But that was the night we found out about her, and then the next day, we went to the morgue to investigate, and she...woke up.”

“Ah.” Castiel knew better than to think anyone who associated with the Winchester men had long to live, or even had long to stay deceased. “A spell of some sort?”

Dean nodded as they headed down a long hall. “Mick found an angel whose grace he could borrow for a little resurrection trick. It was supposed to be you.”

He could hear the accusation in Dean's voice. But he knew where he belonged, and it was watching over Kelly and the Child. He was sorry not to have been able to help when needed, though, and when he got Dean's message that Mary wasn't dead, but also wasn't waking up, he had chosen to come out of hiding for one small, important mission. He would return to Kelly’s side immediately after ensuring that Mary Winchester was saved. She was family. 

“She's in here. Look, she's not gonna die. We just...we just can't be sure she's going to wake up on her own, you know? But…” Dean stopped and grabbed Castiel's arm to prevent him from entering the room. “Are you really sure you're okay? I don't want you using Nephilim juice on my mom. If you do anything that messes her up, I promise you, it will be you who needs healing.”

Castiel sighed. “Dean? One day, we will fix this. I give you my word. One day, there will be trust between us again. But what I am doing is right. I know it in my heart.”

“Yeah,” Dean muttered. “You've known a bunch of stuff over the years. Just...just prove to me you're still one of us, by healing my mom. If I didn't trust you, I wouldn't let you anywhere near her.”

Sam looked up as they entered the room. “Cas?” he hissed. “Cas! Thank God! You need-We need you to help her. Look, I know things have been-”

The angel lifted his hand. “I know. It's all right. Healing your mother is above everything else right now. I know you think I've lost my mind. Again. But everything is clear now. Including how important your mother is. And how important she is to me. She is family.”

Tears washed Sam's cheeks, and a silent, lovely woman stood to approach him and comfort him without a word. Castiel liked her immediately. 

“Eileen,” he sighed. He reached out and touched her hand gently. “Thank you for the warmth you offer my friend.”

She stared at his mouth, and nodded. 

“She can't hear you, Cas.”

He shook his head. “That doesn't matter,” he responded vaguely, and then he turned to the bed. 

A slender woman who radiated strength and pain looked up at him from where she sat at Mary's side. “You're the angel?” she said hoarsely. 

“I'm an angel. I'm disinclined to call myself the angel. We were Legion, before the wars culled our numbers.”

She snorted humorlessly. “Can you fix this?”

“I believe I can. Unless there is something unexpected about her wound. You are Jody Mills, aren't you? The brothers have spoken with great admiration and respect about you. Yes, Jody, I can heal her.”

“I'd be grateful,” she answered. “Please.”

Castiel sensed something intense stringing together the woman lying in the bed and the woman watching over her. He smiled grimly, and took each of their right hands. “Soulmates. It's rare to know for sure, but this is obvious. I'm glad. Mary deserves to share her Heaven with another beautiful warrior.” He let his grace flow into both hands, cooling and soothing every pain, major and minor, enjoying the bittersweet stinging sensation that came with connecting soulmates through healing grace. He corrected the wound in Mary's body, and eased the grief in Jody's heart. “You've each given so much,” he breathed. “Your husbands, your children, your safety. You may rest now, and cry no more, now that you have one another to watch over each of you.”

“The work is never done, Cas,” a hoarse voice breathed from the pillow. 

He gave a tiny smile to Mary. “No.” He nodded at Sam and Eileen. “But it is an easier burden when someone you love is at your side. I must return to my work now.” He turned to sigh at Dean. “And as I do, I know everything I do is for my family, and love for them makes it all worthwhile. It is what commands me in this strange new world where my Father is gone and Heaven is unsure. I love my family. I love you all. And that gives me the strength I need to do what I must.”

Dean closed his eyes in a brief flinch, and when he opened them again, tears sparkled in them. “Take care of yourself, Cas. Don't...don't let down your guard, okay? And call us when you need us. We’ll be there.”

He nodded, touched Dean's arm gently, then turned to disappear down the hall again. 

Before exiting the building, however, he stopped to look at the lone Man of Letters, who seemed to have aged a decade in the last few weeks. 

“Mick Davies.”

The man looked up again. 

“You're quite resourceful.”

“I get on.”

Castiel narrowed his gaze. “Would you allow me to search your heart?”

Mick frowned, but shrugged. “Nothing there I'm not being punished for as we speak.”

The angel touched the man's forehead and paused, then nodded. “Forgive me. I've often judged incorrectly, and it is important to know if one’s intentions are honest.”

“You're not sure you want me hanging with your friends.”

Castiel nodded thoughtfully. “And I wanted to be sure...You have a great deal to repent for, my friend.”

He sighed. 

“You might begin by helping me. Come. We've got work to do.”

Mick shot to his feet. “Me? Working with you? Why? What could I possibly offer-”

“Don't ask stupid questions.” With that, he turned and walked back into the rain, and heard the man hurrying to follow. Castiel was glad. His family was all fine now, and he had paradise to prepare for.


End file.
